The Importance of Owning your Very Own Luxury Designer Handbag

Luxury designer handbags will never go out of style - that's the truth. Owning one straight of the catwalks of Milan and Paris means you got the clout to bust pass the wait list and own one of the most sought after investment pieces. But most women who own the lux handbags are no overnight fashionistas, these women if not born with expensive tastes, have cultivated an elegant eye for quality and excellence when it comes to fashion standards.


Though these are often the IT-list of luxury designer bags - Christian Dior, Fendi, Bottega Veneta, Gucci, Hermès, Louis Vuitton,  Chanel, Balenciaga and Prada - these design houses' leather craftsmanship go back centuries. Only with that rigid and painstaking process of craftsmanship are they able to pull fashion forward. They are able to maintain their classic and cult status among the elite 10% and celebrities. Take any lux bag from any of these houses and pair it with any go-to outfit of the moment or Pre Owned Designer Shoes, and you can expect to liven up your look with class. Because these statement pieces also represent icons of their time, many handbags are designed and named after extraordinary people who exude that style and allure that designers would easily pay tribute as their muse.

Take for example, Princess Grace Kelly of Monaco who inspired the Hermès’ Kelly Bag and the French actress, Jane Birkin after sharing a flight with Hermès chief executive Jean-Louis Dumas, Jane Birkin explained she badly needed a leather weekend bag that suited her lifestyle. And in 1983, the Birkin bag was born, and not just a weekend tote for the French chanteuse, but an iconic bag soon became emblematic of the elite.

Princess Diana was snapped with Christian Dior’s Constance Bag, which soon became the Christian Dior's Lady Dior Bag.  Even fictional fashionistas like Carrie Bradshaw were able to elevate luxury designer bags into mainstream consciousness, making her Fendi Baguette a coveted bag.

You can expect compliments from friends with these timeless bag pieces because just merely acquiring them is a year-long waiting game for some and a jaw dropper for many, consider that a luxury handbag price ranges from $1,500 to over $250,000.

Each design house can call upon a sudden surge in its price tag, and no one can demand to complain about it. Complaining just means you can't afford it. Still, these fashion gems are not fast-fashion throwaways, they are good market investments as well.  Overtime, their rarity and demand can skyrocket and even earn you extra if you decide to part with your luxury hand bag.

5 Ways to Stay Beautiful: Great Facial Skin Care at No Cost!

Banish those blemishes by taking time to care for your face. Imagine, dirt congealing in your pores after a long day from work resulting in those pesky pimples, blackheads, comedones and whiteheads. A nightly skin ritual should do the trick, if you care about face and want to fight off aging this early, a regular deep pore cleansing is a must.

What are Comedones?
Comedones are those inflamed pustules under the skin that after sometime becomes closed off by a black colored cap of skin. Comedones are a build-up of oil, free radicals and yes, bacteria on the face. So be kind to the skin on your face, you only have one beautiful mug and you should love it more than anything - its the first thing you see in the bathroom each morning. Know what it takes to keep your face fresh and its pores clog-free.

Wash your Face - how easy is that? A good scrub just before bedtime can be satisfying, enjoy that soft sensation massaging dirt off your face. Never go to bed without washing your face and never lay down forgetting to remove your make-up. This should be a good hygiene habit like brushing your teeth. Don't be too lazy or tired, or forgetful, this isn't a difficult thing to do. Clearing your face of make-up and smog residue from the streets will allow your pores to breathe for the night. Not washing the dirt off will allow dirt to congeal creating more comedones.

Stay golden, not greasy! Highly emollient face creams may give you that creamy soothing texture when applied and feels soft on the skin, but such creams easily clog the pores, this further encourages the skin on your face to create more oil than needed.

Avoid skin irritants. Irritants and chemical ingredients such as additives and binders are usually found in bar soaps and facial scrubs. Be more choosy with what you choose to put on your face, the way you're fussy about what you eat. There are many ways to achieve that facial glow and number one on that list is to be mindful of the products you use on a daily basis.

Drink plenty of water. One can't stress this enough! Keep yourself hydrated throughout the day, this is essential if you want great skin from within. Besides the basic 8 glasses of water a day, you can also opt for natural teas or fresh fruit juice. Some go the extra mile and drink a gallon of water daily.



Say yes to that facial massage. Make bank and visit a professional beauty esthetician, once a month is ideal. Peak your skincare by visiting a dermatologist as well and get a beauty treatment plan to improve your skin. A good facial improves blood circulation, increasing the flow of oxygen-rich red blood cells to your skin.

All this beauty regimen is pretty much Do-It-Yourself! Meaning girls, you should love yourself more! Drop that cellphone before bedtime and do yourself a favor, stick to that beauty routine because all you need are your hands and some ME time (let's say 10 minutes nightly) to stay beautiful!

Shoes: Some Tips for This Season

Buying shoes is a staple among the fashion savvy and trendy, but you have to keep these pointers in mind when you’re aching to burn some cash for some hot picks for this season. 

Invest in year round shoes.  You’ll definitely have staples to use all year round but if you’re choosing seasonal items don’t invest too much in them.  For example, it’s fine to go for fastfood fare like Topman for fashion items that are specific to a season, such as Summer 2014 for example.  You’ll be wearing them for a couple of times in the course of a year so it’s not practical to spend too much on them.   

Wait for Sales.  Sales are pretty common in any shoe shop, so if you don’t want to buy cheap, buy smart by watching out for deals!

Spend on what counts.  Shoes, coats, blazers should be your main spending priorities—simple shirts and other clothing items don’t need to be brand label level clothing.  Just pick the part of your wardrobe to accentuate and wear clothes around those items. 

Spend for comfortable shoes.  Spend as much as you can on your shoes and your bed. If you’re not in one you’re in the others.

When the Money Monsters Ate the Fashion Wunderkinds: The Death of Coutorture.com and Fashionologie.com

As if losing Coutorture.com wasn't devastating enough, revamping Coutorture.com into Fashionologie and then dumping both and turning into mainstream fare called Popsugar.

What I love and remember about Coutorture is that they have all the collections from runway shows catalog per season and goes as far back you could imagine. Fashionologie has a directory of designers (a wiki of sorts) that showcased what they've done, where they came from and whether they're emerging or pro or just outdated or still active in the biz. I just love that part because that's the link I send my non-fashionista friends to.

What really happened was- the Sugar Network went shopping and hoarded all the promising and ingenious fashion blogs out there. They played with it for awhile, kept a few gems until they didn't know what to do with the blogs anymore. That they had to chew them back in again and spat out that thing redirects Coutorture and Fashionologie fans to PopSugar.com ~ WHAT A TRAGEDY!

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Stella McCartney Tours Asia

Stella McCartney took a trip to the Far East to open several of her flagship stores with a ultra luxury event culminating in Hong Kong with supermodel Kate Moss.

Not to be outdone by HK though, the Stella McCartney event in Beijing was purely spellbinding!

Contortionists and plate spinners abound

The second Stella McCartney shop in Japan opened in Roppongi Hills, to much style as well, using simple and natural materials and getting crazy with the amazing eponymous topiary.

There were cakes and Japanese cream puffs in the 127 square metre shop which reflects the brand's intimate and personal side.

Stella McCartney's plexi-glass clutches on display.

Stella seeing to detail before the show at the British embassy in Tokyo.

Stella spent the last month boosting her brand's profile in Asia's key fashion capitals with much success

Byzantine Couture Hit the Dolce & Gabbana Runway at Milan Fashion Week 2013

Walk fierce and wear a fresco: a rich historical tableaux of religious iconography took center stage at the latest D&G collection in Milan. Mainly inspired by Sicily’s Monreale Cathedral and perhaps a recent resignation of a pontificate.

Golden mosaics, A-line full skirts, the classic Sicilian silhouette revisited and fabrics in cardinal red- all stunning with a crown to cap it off.

Posh Victoria and her Spice Boys

Fashionable familia ever! The Beckhams were game-on at the press night of Viva Forever last December 11 at the Piccadilly Theatre in London, England. Viva Forever is a Spice Girls musical about girl's venture into instant celebrity thinking it would last forever.

The Spice Girls – Melanie Brown, Geri Halliwell, Emma Bunton, and Melanie Chisholm – took on the red carpet together while Victoria Beckham attended the event with her lovely family.

Little Harper Seven maybe outta sigh at this family outing, but the Beckham boys- Brooklyn, Romeo & Cruz- are really rocking their Burberrys with their posh matriarch. Victoria, however was adamant to wear only her eponymous label. 

H&M and the House of Margiela Collab

H&M and Margiela has just given their official statement- the exciting collab will be available on November 15 2012 in 230 stores and online!



The house of Margiela without the real Margiela is quick to add that "The democracy of our fashion has always been at the centre of our creativity, and the collaboration with H&M allows us to push this instinct further. We will bring together the contrasting universes of the two houses in ways that will surprise all."

For those new to Margiela, the house is known for their pristinely cut pieces- mostly basics in the line of everyday shirts, skirts, pants, and sweaters. More hard-core fans should expect lovely suiting, morbid photography prints on fabrics and attention-grabbing shoes.

Uniqlo Wake-Up Alarm App for the iPhone and Android

Good morning world! Uniqlo that online retail catalog store from Tokyo, Japan is at it again! Known for their awesome social media and marketing campaigns, Uniqlo is now dipping its feet into mobile apps and giving their customers a very pleasant wake-up call with their edgy UNIQLO WAKE UP app. Worth a download in my book!

Wake up with music that changes with the weather. Share the start of your day.
　
UNIQLO WAKE UP is an innovative new social alarm app that aims to make waking up every day an enjoyable experience. The alarm music, which is automatically created based on the weather, time, and day of the week, was co-written by 51st annual Grammy nominee Cornelius (Keigo Oyamada) and Yoko Kanno, who is active in songwriting across a wide range of genres including video games and anime (COWBOY BEBOP, Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex, Macross).



The app allows users to share a record of their awakening – specifically, the time, weather, and temperature at the moment they stopped the alarm – via social media (Facebook, Twitter, RenRen, Weibo). In addition, the “wake up records” shared by users around the world are displayed in a part of the app entitled WORLD WAKE UP.



Mobile App Features:
• Users can set an alarm.
• Users either select their location from a pull-down menu or allow the app to find their location using GPS. The app then displays the current weather and temperature.
• The alarm music changes according to the weather and reads out the time, day of the week, and the weather.
• The alarm music vocals are available in English and Mandarin Chinese.
• Users can share the time, weather, and temperature of when they wake up on Facebook, Twitter, RenRen, and Weibo.
• The information users share is displayed in the WORLD WAKE UP part of the app.
• The app background changes according to the day of the week.

Google's Goggles: Would You Wear One?

The future is here, too soon. It feels like the 'Eye Phone' episode from Futurama except it's not coming from the big tech Apple, it's coming from the GooG! If this is the first gen of the Google glasses, I can just imagine what the 5th gen would be like? Holograms, teleportation, time travel? haha Stalkers are now celebrating everywhere and Big Brother's having a party! The Goog says you can always turn it off, but I think this play on free will is just an illusion, I mean who's stopping Google or some hacker from turning it on, and enjoy the voyeuristic ride of seeing what you see everyday. But my biggest concern with the Google glasses? Are they fashionable? Would Tom Ford be jealous with the look?

Here's a video that demonstrates the POV of the Google glasses and the user experience that comes with it, this would be like 'total connectivity' if takes off and the Goog glasses hit the market.t.

Stella McCartney's Team Great Britain kit

There seems to be no love for Stella McCartney's Team Great Britain kit (that's the British Olympic Athlete's uniform) under the Adidas flagship. The backlash is coming from the Brits themselves who feel the essence of the flag has been desecrated, as the design leaves out, the St. George and St. Patrick crosses which represent England and Ireland.

The Great Britain kit has more subdued blues, greys and whites whilst relegating the iconic red in subtle touches like red piping, socks and trimming. The sacrilegious take on the Union Jack has some Britons up in arms and the out cry stems from something really basic that the designer overlooked and the Olympic uniform lacks- it's not that identifiable as Great Britain. Sports enthusiasts looking forward to this year's Olympics, might even mistake players as coming from Team USA or Team Botswana during the events.

Fashion Apps for the iPad

Let your fingers do the shopping with these awesome iPad Apps. As fashion houses and retailers race to create the best iPad apps to represent their brand and clothing line, any fashion maven is in for a trendy treat.
Retail Store Fashion iPad Apps

 Take a break between office hours and take a look at the latest haul at fast-fashion shops Zara and H&M. These iPad apps will enable you You will be able to use features that enable you to create a wish
list, check your gift card balance and check your social media wall.

• You will be able to share your favourite items with friends and family through Facebook, Twitter, email or any social network of your choice.



The Zara Fashion App
Better than going through a closet filled with clothes, the best thing is you don't have get undress or clean up  after. The app is an easy breeze through the latest Zara collections and store arrivals. Get it FREE on itunes!



Fashion Apps for the iPad
View realtime runway styles as they happen during the much anticipated Fashion Weeks of New York, Milan and Paris. With iPad Apps you can receive style feeds direct from ateliers, fashion editors and indie fashion bloggers.



Fashion iPad Apps
The world of fashion is at your fingertips with The Cut on the Runway iPad app. See collections from New York, London, Paris, Milan; watch videos of shows; browse/search catwalk photos; rate the latest looks; and enjoy up-to-the-minute fashion news.

Anna Sui Spring 2012 Luggage in Jet Set Purple

Anna Sui has is letting her purple butterfly travel with her spring 2012 bags and luggage collection in collaboration with Tumi. Anna Sui's signature whimsy is perfectly mixed with Tumi’s higly functional aesthetics, the outcome is a sturdy set of stylish traveling pieces which includes protective gear for gadgets and portables. 

The collection carries Anna Sui’s butterfly signature purple and black palette and consists of 4 pieces, including the Tumi Vapor™ International Carry-On case, Laptop case, Just In Case™ Tote and Shoe Bags. Available at Tumi.com

The High Fashion Vending Machine at NYFW

Don't expect this vending machine to run with quarters or pennies, but it will give you that Fashion in an instant fix you need. There aren't any snicker bars or week-old egg sandwiches in its inventory, mainly its part of the fashion incubator program by the CFDA to make high-end and emerging fashion accessible. Quite a concept, if you ask me!



The CFDA and Morgans Hotel Group have teamed up for NYFW with a fashion vending machine (yes, I said vending machine).  The machine will showcase emerging CFDA fashion talent from its {FASHION INCUBATOR}  program at The Hudson Hotel, steps away from Lincoln Center.


The oversized vending machine will offer guests and NYFW visitors a completely different experience from the typical gift and souvenir shop.  The fashion vending machine will be located at the lobby of The Hudson Hotel and will carry items from several designers including, Alice Ritter, Gemma Redux, Grey Ant, Jolibe, Public School, Ruby Kobo, and Sang A.  So for your buck you can go for these items inside the ultra hip vending machine.

The Best Spring 2011 Magazine Cover: Anaïs Pouliot on Acne Paper

A very impeccable magazine cover by Acne Paper for Spring 2011.


I think my eyes are going to melt, so much high-fashion in one stance. Great work by fashion photographer Daniel Jackson and stylist Mattias Karlsson. Anaïs Pouliot is pure perfection!